Resorts International

Resorts International was a hotel and casino company. From its origins as a paint company, it moved into the resort business in the 1960s with the development of Paradise Island in the Bahamas, and then expanded to Atlantic City, New Jersey with the opening of Resorts Casino Hotel in 1978. After the death of its longtime chairman, James Crosby, in 1986, the company was briefly controlled by Donald Trump, before being acquired by Merv Griffin in 1988. It was acquired by Sun International in 1996.

In 1958, the Mary Carter Paint Company, a New Jersey paint manufacturer, was acquired by a group of investors. James Crosby, son of one of the investors, was appointed to lead the company.

With its paint business on the decline, Mary Carter sought to diversify into the land development business. It acquired 1,200 acres of land near Freeport, Bahamas in 1962, followed by a 75 percent interest in Paradise Island in 1966. The company built a bridge to the island and developed it with hotels and restaurants, and opened the Paradise Island Casino there in 1967. In 1968, Mary Carter sold its paint division and changed its name to Resorts International.

Other ventures that the company undertook were short-lived, including ownership of the Biff Burger fast food chain from 1962 to 1976, an investment in an experimental shrimp farm in Mexico in the early 1970s, ownership of the Marine World/Africa USA theme park in California from 1972 to 1979, and an aborted deal to purchase half of slot machine maker Williams Electronics in 1978.

Crosby led Resorts on several forays into the airline industry over the years. The company made efforts towards acquiring Pan American World Airways in 1969, but backed down after Congress intervened to make such a takeover more difficult. Resorts purchased Chalk's International Airlines, a small airline offering seaplane service between Florida and the Bahamas, in 1974; the company would operate the airline until selling it in 1991.

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